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3/6/12

The Bazaarness of Philosophy

Colin McGinn writes in The Stone that "philosophy" is a bad word for philosophy. It brings to mind someone who works on "unearthing and explicating the 'meaning of life' and what the ultimate goods are" - but philosophers may do nothing of the kind.

I do get this - back in the days when I "did" philosophy of mind and language it annoyed me no end to sit next to someone on a train or plane and get asked about the meaning of life, just because I said I studied philosophy. People don't understand that most of philosophy is not that sort of thing.

But it's not just being taken for a meaning-ologist that bothers McGinn. He wants to be seen as a scientist.

Our current name is harmful because it posits a big gap between the
sciences and philosophy; we do something that is not a science. Thus we
do not share in the intellectual prestige associated with that
thoroughly modern word. We are accordingly not covered by the media that
cover the sciences, and what we do remains a mystery to most people.
But it is really quite clear that academic philosophy is a science. The
dictionary defines a science as “a systematically organized body of
knowledge on any subject.” This is a very broad definition, which
includes not just subjects like physics and chemistry but also
psychology, economics, mathematics and even “library science.”

Okay .... I'd sure like to be seen as a scientist, but here's the thing. If you're around philosophy for a long time, you can't help but notice that philosophers don't seem much like scientists. Top level philosophy sometimes does seem to reveal what is simply true. There are genuine insights--discoveries that everyone simply has to bow down to. (Like... what? Hilary Putnam's famous article "The Meaning of 'Meaning'" comes to mind.) But much of the time, philosophy makes me think of the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul--lots and lots of stalls, people selling different things at every stall. They sell with the tools of logic, making "arguments", but something funny's going on when "arguments" support contradictory conclusions.

Each of the arguers in the philosophical Bazaar certainly feels like a scientist--a systematic, rationally-guided knower. The focus of each philosopher is on reality-- philosophers are not making stuff up, as in writing fiction or composing music. But there's just no ignoring the people shouting in the other stalls. Their existence calls into question whether what's produced at each stall is really very science-like at all.

Because of all this fragmentation, you get a phrase in philosophy that's really strange, when you think about it. If you're describing what a philosopher thinks, it's common to say "For X, _____." As in, "For Hume, the self is a bundle." What does this even mean? Either the self is a bundle or it is not. How can it be that "for Hume" the self is a bundle? This locution raises a disconcerting possibility. What philosophy offers is not discovery of truths, but ways of thinking about things. Hume thought of the self as a bundle: that was his way of thinking of the self. Thus, "for him" the self was a bundle. Perhaps we'd like to adopt that way of thinking too. Then for us too, the self would be a bundle. But that's not to say it would be a bundle. If you wanted philosophy to be a science, you'd have to somehow overcome the Grand Bazaar tendency, and get rid of all that "for X"-ing.

McGinn doesn't seem to notice the Bazaarness of philosophy. He writes--

Academic philosophy obviously falls under this capacious meaning.
Moreover, most of the marks of science as commonly understood are shared
by academic philosophy: the subject is systematic, rigorous, replete
with technical vocabulary, often in conflict with common sense, capable
of refutation, produces hypotheses, uses symbolic notation, is about the
natural world, is institutionalized, peer-reviewed, tenure-granting,
etc. We may as well recognize that we are a science, even if not one
that makes empirical observations or uses much mathematics. Once we do
this officially, we can expect to be treated like scientists.

Can it really be true that 10 people are being "systematic and rigorous", if they arrive at 10 different conclusions on the same subject? Not really, and that's why we're stuck with the word "philosophy." McGinn says it's "faintly shameful" but so is the whole business of selling views as if they were rationally supported, when the guy or gal at the next stall is selling something else.

12 comments:

Anonymous
said...

It's funny to note that all of the "characteristics" of science listed by McGinn are plainly surface qualities. Does he honestly believe that the success of physical science is due to "technical vocabulary" and "symbolic notation" in the literature, or the fact that both departments are "tenure-granting" and "institutionalized"? His argument sure makes it seem like he does. It should be obvious that there is some fundamental methodological difference that is responsible for the success of science over other magisteria (including philosophy), but it's definitely neither peer-review nor jargon.

I agree, although with two caveats. I'm not sure how serious McGinn is being, given that he says he wants to launch the Campaign for Renaming Academic Philosophy, and draws attention to what the acronym would be. Secondly, I'm not so sure that "Each of the arguers in the philosophical Bazaar certainly feels like a scientist--a systematic, rationally-guided knower." I wonder how many "continental" philosophers feel that way about their work (I don't mean this as a criticism of them), for instance. Do applied ethicists who identify as non-cognitivists think of themselves as rationally-guided knowers? It seems unlikely. I know I don't feel like a scientist.

I'm not sure how serious McGinn is about renaming philosophy. One of his suggestions is "beology". Really? (Is it April 1st?) In any case, philosophy is surely not science in the normal meaning of that word. What would "philosophy of science" mean: the science of science? Philosophers are not scientists but building inspectors who examine the constructions of scientists and others.

I've always interpreted the "For X, ___" locution as "According to X, ___", or "X holds the view that ___", or "As far as X is concerned, ___". So interpreted, this locution indicates X bearing some attitude towards the view ___, rather than ___ holding in some X-mediated way (e.g. ___ holds in the X-way-of-thinking-about-things). It may still be, as I take you to be proposing, that the latter is all that can sensibly be said about the 'truth' of many or most philosophical views. But (for me) the "For X, ___" locutions do not reveal anything substantive on this score.

I think McGinn was playing around with new names, but probably serious about thinking philosophy is science-like and deserves the high status of science.

SKG-- I can't imagine anyone describing a debate between two biologists by saying "For X, blah-blah, but for Y, blah-blah-blah." The "for" locution suggests that each person is living in a private world. It's what you'd say about a very subjective matter like taste--for me, Thai food is just right, but for my son, it's too hot. In fact, a standard way of expressing moral relativism is to say "For the Eskimos, infanticide is permissible, but for Americans it is wrong." This isn't meant to just indicate a difference in what people believe, but an ultimate difference in what is true "for them".

Yes... 10 people can be systematic and rigorous if they arrive to different conclusions on the same topic.

Look at Theoretical physics. There are several theories about how the universe works. They are all systematically and rigorously examined theories, and they simply can't all be true.

I think Theoretical physics is modern day metaphysics in many ways. The earlier ancient philosophers were thinking of things like the fundamental element in the universe... Its Water... Its air. If that's philosophy, then why is string theory any less philosophy? It's on the same topic, with the same constraints (it's a theory that was arrived to by observation and reason. And String theory is inherently untestable by experiment(at least so far)).

I don't know how often I make references to science, psychology, biology, physics, etc. in my philosophy courses. You can't talk about Free Will without talking about physics, psychology, and neurobiology.

The difference between philosophy and science isn't agreement or testability, its investigative scope. Philosophy includes so much more under avenues of investigation, like values and logic, that science doesn't, and in some ways, can't include. But its our jobs, as philosophers, to partly educate the public that what science does, is essentially an extension of philosophy, but not philosophy in total. Just like Chemistry is an extension of science, but not science in total.

This is a link to a post I wrote about Stephen Hawking saying that philosophy was dead, but it tries to address the same issue. Philosophy is not science, because it is not engaged in explanation; but not all intellectually serious activities are explanation.

"Can it really be true that 10 people are being "systematic and rigorous", if they arrive at 10 different conclusions on the same subject?"

In mathematics, if the axiom of choice is assumed, then it is possible to well order any set. If the axiom of choice does not hold, then not all sets may be well ordered. Can it really be true that these are rigorous facts if they arrive at different conclusions on the same subject?

"Can it really be true that these are rigorous facts if they arrive at different conclusions on the same subject?"

This is a red herring. The AoC is an axiom-you assume it or you don't. It simply adds to the toolbox, so that you can deal with objects involving infinity. To say that you arrive at different conclusions is incorrect. There is simply more constructions available.

You don't get contradictory conclusions in mathematics as you do in philosophy. Starting with the same set of axioms, you can't build statement P and statement ~P and have them simultaneous be true. You can find statements whose true value is impossible to determine with the given set of axioms, but that's completely different philosophy's 10 different conclusions. Moreover, by adding an axiom to the original set, you then can make the statement decidable to everyone's satisfaction.

"Can it really be true that 10 people are being "systematic and rigorous", if they arrive at 10 different conclusions on the same subject?"

This sentence could only be written by someone who hasn't had much experience in philosophy. In fact, philosophers agree on a wide majority of central issues. See the results of David Chalmers' PhilPapers survey if you are interested. Until then, avoid making silly-sounding claims about what philosophers agree or disagree upon, for which you have no evidence anyway,

Both Kazez and McGinn are wrong. Philosophy is not a science because philosophers are not bound by empirical investigation. That doesn't mean we don't take empirical investigations seriously; it just means that what we deal with is not exhausted by what can be empirically determined. Most of us fancy that we deal with things that can't be determined empirically, which of course doesn't mean they can't be determined rationally.

The problem is that it's very difficult if not impossible to establish something rationally (rather than empirically) for all time. But of course philosophical claims are rationally supported. That's part of what makes them genuinely philosophical. Otherwise they wouldn't be worth thinking about, or they'd be, say, religious claims. Kazez seems to think that if something is rationally supported no one can disagree with it. "McGinn says it's "faintly shameful" but so is the whole business of selling views as if they were rationally supported, when the guy or gal at the next stall is selling something else." That's clearly wrong, since supporting something rationally doesn't establish its truth with certainty. The best it can do is establish its truth for now (until some better argument comes along).

"This is a red herring. The AoC is an axiom-you assume it or you don't. It simply adds to the toolbox, so that you can deal with objects involving infinity. To say that you arrive at different conclusions is incorrect. There is simply more constructions available."

We know this now, thanks to high power results in logic, but what would you have said before its independence was established? And even now, one can still ask, "Is it true?" Maybe it's "just a philosophical question", but that doesn't mean you can't approach it systematically, and that some viewpoints may have more merit than others.

My point, of course, was just to observe that different conclusions may naturally arise from different assumptions, all of which may be equally valid. No one would argue against you assuming either AC or ~AC, but apparently the argument is that for philosophy it's not okay if you end up with contradictory results, even if it's just because you've made different assumptions (implicitly or explicitly).

"You don't get contradictory conclusions in mathematics as you do in philosophy. Starting with the same set of axioms, you can't build statement P and statement ~P and have them simultaneous be true."

Again, I don't mean to compare the practice of mathematics to that of philosophy. I brought up a mathematical example to emphasize that rigorous thought may proceed from different assumptions to different conclusions, and to suggest that this is implicitly how philosophy works.

As an aside, though, it's not like contradictory results have never been reached while studying mathematics. When it's happened, usually it indicated a need to reexamine one's assumptions more carefully. When that happens, I'd say what you're doing is pretty similar to what's done in philosophy. (It might even count as philosophy.)

There isn't really a way to guarantee that it won't happen again. We don't even know if logic itself is consistent. Maybe it will turn out not to be.

"You can find statements whose true value is impossible to determine with the given set of axioms, but that's completely different philosophy's 10 different conclusions. Moreover, by adding an axiom to the original set, you then can make the statement decidable to everyone's satisfaction."

Same caveat -- this isn't what I was trying to get at.

To me the difference is that in math, we just happen to understand the assumptions we're making very precisely, and they don't make much difference most of the time. In philosophy, you're not working in an axiom system, and that's kind of the point. That doesn't mean it's not systematic and rigorous. You carefully explore the consequences of various points of view to understand them better.

I don't know that every philosopher reasons rigorously (not every scientist or mathematician does their job properly either), but reaching contradictory conclusions doesn't suggest anything wrong to me.